real noob help
- Thread starter pdasterly
- Start date
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That's a pretty big question, which might explain why you haven't gotten much in the way of replies yet! From a high level, there's a few things you'll need to consider.
1. The DL320s appears to be an older machine, from HP's fifth-generation Proliant line. That said, it won't have much in the way of processing capability, will probably be pretty loud, and won't be nearly as power efficient as a machine of even a slightly newer vintage. But it should work to hold data! Assuming the server itself is complete and in working condition (it has a processor, RAM, power supplies, and can actually boot up) then you've got a start. You need to think about where you're going to keep it - obviously it will need to be connected to your network and have power, but you probably don't want it in a living space because of the noise.
2. You'll need hard drives for it if you don't already have them, preferably two for running whatever OS and applications you want on the server and two or more for storage. I think your machine takes 3.5" drives, and you'll need the drive trays/caddies to mount them properly. If it uses the P400 raid controller (which was standard for HP G5 servers) then you can use both SAS and SATA drives, but I think you can only use drives that are 2TB or less. It is a hardware RAID card, so you can build redundancy into the storage by using RAID 1, 10, or 5, but remember that RAID itself is not a backup solution. I would use RAID 1 for the "system" drives and RAID 5 for any media drives. You could use RAID 10 for the media, and it does offer better redundancy and better performance, but you lose more capacity. Wikipedia has a good article on the various RAID levels and their pros/cons. Keep in mind that the drives in an array should be identical, and that if you're not using "enterprise" type drives than RAID can be finicky.
3. How you plan to access your media sets the software requirements. The simplest thing for a beginner is probably to just install some version of Windows on the server and share files/folders from there. iTunes can access shared files over the SMB protocol (which Windows shares use) but you'd have to check for your media player. If it can open network shares directly, it should work. You could always look into something more specific to media sharing/file storage like Plex or file shares with FreeNAS, but those are a little more to set up.
If you really want my honest opinion, while the server might be fun to play around with it might not be the best option for your goals. It is a pretty old piece of equipment, about 10 years now, and will be pretty loud and consume a lot of power while not delivering a lot of performance. For simple media sharing you might be better served by a basic NAS unit; Netgear makes decent ones that can hold a couple of drives for home use. Not to discourage you from playing around with a server, but just make sure that you have realistic expectations! Since you already have the DL320s and it can hold a lot of drives it might be worth it to stay with it, if only for the experience.
Hope that helped and good luck!
1. The DL320s appears to be an older machine, from HP's fifth-generation Proliant line. That said, it won't have much in the way of processing capability, will probably be pretty loud, and won't be nearly as power efficient as a machine of even a slightly newer vintage. But it should work to hold data! Assuming the server itself is complete and in working condition (it has a processor, RAM, power supplies, and can actually boot up) then you've got a start. You need to think about where you're going to keep it - obviously it will need to be connected to your network and have power, but you probably don't want it in a living space because of the noise.
2. You'll need hard drives for it if you don't already have them, preferably two for running whatever OS and applications you want on the server and two or more for storage. I think your machine takes 3.5" drives, and you'll need the drive trays/caddies to mount them properly. If it uses the P400 raid controller (which was standard for HP G5 servers) then you can use both SAS and SATA drives, but I think you can only use drives that are 2TB or less. It is a hardware RAID card, so you can build redundancy into the storage by using RAID 1, 10, or 5, but remember that RAID itself is not a backup solution. I would use RAID 1 for the "system" drives and RAID 5 for any media drives. You could use RAID 10 for the media, and it does offer better redundancy and better performance, but you lose more capacity. Wikipedia has a good article on the various RAID levels and their pros/cons. Keep in mind that the drives in an array should be identical, and that if you're not using "enterprise" type drives than RAID can be finicky.
3. How you plan to access your media sets the software requirements. The simplest thing for a beginner is probably to just install some version of Windows on the server and share files/folders from there. iTunes can access shared files over the SMB protocol (which Windows shares use) but you'd have to check for your media player. If it can open network shares directly, it should work. You could always look into something more specific to media sharing/file storage like Plex or file shares with FreeNAS, but those are a little more to set up.
If you really want my honest opinion, while the server might be fun to play around with it might not be the best option for your goals. It is a pretty old piece of equipment, about 10 years now, and will be pretty loud and consume a lot of power while not delivering a lot of performance. For simple media sharing you might be better served by a basic NAS unit; Netgear makes decent ones that can hold a couple of drives for home use. Not to discourage you from playing around with a server, but just make sure that you have realistic expectations! Since you already have the DL320s and it can hold a lot of drives it might be worth it to stay with it, if only for the experience.
Hope that helped and good luck!
thanks for reply. I have netgear readynas rn104 with 4 8tb drives, works perfect for what i want but i need more storage.
only need machine to file serve, media player(himedia q5 pro)(itunes airplay) handles everything else
server works but im ignorant to professional computer lmao. Cant get to boot freenas and machine only has 2 usb ports. I believe machine has p800 raid controller and ram is maxed at whopping 8gb, also machine has rear hdd option(2 scsi drives). Would like to setup to run jbod
only need machine to file serve, media player(himedia q5 pro)(itunes airplay) handles everything else
server works but im ignorant to professional computer lmao. Cant get to boot freenas and machine only has 2 usb ports. I believe machine has p800 raid controller and ram is maxed at whopping 8gb, also machine has rear hdd option(2 scsi drives). Would like to setup to run jbod
That makes sense. Even though it's not a performer, it can hold a lot of drives! The P800 controller is based on the same tech as the P400 and will have the same drive size limitation. I think it might have affected a lot if not all SAS1 controllers; I had a Dell PERC 6/i that also had that limitation. If you're looking to use 2TB or less drives, then it should work. Otherwise you can grab a P410 controller, which are cheap as dirt even with a large cache, and it should work. You might need to change some cabling though - the P800/P400 used the old style SAS connectors (SFF-8484) while the newer ones use SFF-8087. They are compatible and only require cheap adapters to swap out.
FreeNAS should boot on it, but looking at the hardware requirements it's at the very lowest end. Are you trying to boot it from a CD drive or a USB stick? Make sure the BIOS is set to allow booting from whichever option you choose. HP usually uses F10 at startup to access BIOS settings.
If you're trying to run a JBOD as opposed to using the RAID functions of the controller card, HP makes it a little tricky. Only a few of their newer HBAs support true JBOD mode, on the older ones you have to make a RAID0 array for each drive. In this way, the host OS will see each drive as an individual array/device and you can use them as a JBOD.
Just to throw this out there, you might want to keep an eye out for a 12-bay DL180 G6 or equivalent system. They are basically the next iteration from the DL320s line, but have way better specs and are of course newer. There's a lot of info on the forums here about them, and if you look around you can get one for close to $100 shipped with processor and memory included. The DL180 G6 was the base system, but they went by other names (SE1220, SE326m1, and P4500) and often included the better iLO2 IPMI system. I recently bought a P4500 unit and am working to make a SAN out of it with a P812 card and a D2700 disk enclosure.
FreeNAS should boot on it, but looking at the hardware requirements it's at the very lowest end. Are you trying to boot it from a CD drive or a USB stick? Make sure the BIOS is set to allow booting from whichever option you choose. HP usually uses F10 at startup to access BIOS settings.
If you're trying to run a JBOD as opposed to using the RAID functions of the controller card, HP makes it a little tricky. Only a few of their newer HBAs support true JBOD mode, on the older ones you have to make a RAID0 array for each drive. In this way, the host OS will see each drive as an individual array/device and you can use them as a JBOD.
Just to throw this out there, you might want to keep an eye out for a 12-bay DL180 G6 or equivalent system. They are basically the next iteration from the DL320s line, but have way better specs and are of course newer. There's a lot of info on the forums here about them, and if you look around you can get one for close to $100 shipped with processor and memory included. The DL180 G6 was the base system, but they went by other names (SE1220, SE326m1, and P4500) and often included the better iLO2 IPMI system. I recently bought a P4500 unit and am working to make a SAN out of it with a P812 card and a D2700 disk enclosure.